A Black History Month Salute to Black Inventors

Empower Magazine Salutes a History of Black Innovations and Inventors

In his new book “Black Inventors, Crafting Over 200 Years of Success,” author Keith C. Holmes has taken the torch ignited by African American patent examiner, Henry E. Baker, to research and write about Black innovators and inventors from a global prospective. Baker published “The Colored Inventor, A Record of Fifty Years,” in 1913, the first book to explore and cite the various inventions by people of color.

From the beginning of the oldest and greatest civilization – the ancestral link from the Blacks in Ancient Egypt to their descendants who are now scattered to the four corners of the world – the world of creating, inventing and designing has always been a part of the Black experience.

Over the last 500 years Black people from Africa, and their descendants, have fully participated in the development of the world’s agricultural, business, medical and scientific innovations.

When citing inventors, few books mention the accomplishments of Black inventors outside of the United States. That list often excludes Black inventors from Africa, Australia, Canada, the Caribbean, Central and South America, Europe, Russia and the United Kingdom.With the internet, access to library resources, and good communications being the key to unlocking the past., the significant role of Black people is now being unearthed. The work of uncovering Black inventors has begun.

“I must acknowledge the work of Henry E. Baker an African American patent examiner who, in 1913 published The Colored Inventor, A Record of Fifty Years. This book laid the foundation for researching Black Inventors, as It was the first book to explore and cite the various inventions by people of color,” said Holmes.

Taking the torch ignited by Mr. Baker, Black Inventors, Crafting Over 200 Years of Success covers Black innovators and inventors from a global prospective. It identifies Black inventors from Africa, Australia, Canada, the Caribbean, Central and SouthAmerica, Europe, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States.

This book gives the librarian, reader, researcher, student and teacher the opportunity to discover inventors from your particular country or state. It is an invaluable book that discloses information on inventors, who until, now have remained obscure and unknown.

Mr. Holmes specializes in research on Black and indigenous inventors.

About Keith Holmes

For thirty years, Mr. Holmes has worked in the satellite communications industry, and since 1977, he has used computers from main frames to personal computers. Mr. Holmes has spent considerable time researching information on Black inventors at the New York Patent Library, the Schomburg Library in New York and the Howard University’s Moorland-Spingarn Research Center in Washington, DC. He has lectured in Barbados, California, Canada, Connecticut, Illinois, New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Washington, DC, and is currently working on several projects about Black inventors. Mr. Holmes has spent over twenty years researching information on Black innovators and inventors from around the world.